When God Corrects You

Hello beloved child of God, I hope you’re preparing yourself to have a blessed week in The presence of The Lord.
A few days ago, a friend of mine shared a verse with me (Hebrews 12:8), he probably didn’t know that God was using him to give this verse to me to stretch me.
To get the verse’s deeper meaning, I had to put it in context and read a few verses prior to it and following it.
It’s around the whole theme of sin, I wish you read this till the end because it’s deep and because it’s beautiful.
Hebrews 12:1‭-‬11 MSG

Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus , who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there , in the place of honor, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility he plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls! In this all-out match against sin, others have suffered far worse than you, to say nothing of what Jesus went through—all that bloodshed! So don’t feel sorry for yourselves. Or have you forgotten how good parents treat children, and that God regards you as his children? My dear child, don’t shrug off God’s discipline, but don’t be crushed by it either. It’s the child he loves that he disciplines; the child he embraces, he also corrects. God is educating you; that’s why you must never drop out. He’s treating you as dear children. This trouble you’re in isn’t punishment; it’s training , the normal experience of children. Only irresponsible parents leave children to fend for themselves. Would you prefer an irresponsible God? We respect our own parents for training and not spoiling us, so why not embrace God’s training so we can truly live ? While we were children, our parents did what seemed best to them. But God is doing what is best for us, training us to live God’s holy best. At the time, discipline isn’t much fun. It always feels like it’s going against the grain. Later, of course, it pays off handsomely, for it’s the well-trained who find themselves mature in their relationship with God.

I know it looks quite long, but let’s keep going please. We’re going to break these down, and outline why God’s correction/discipline is so important for us.

1. Jesus Christ Didn’t Die On The Cross For You To Be A Slave To Sin

Hebrews 12:1 NIV

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,

Imagine you spend a whole year saving for a birthday gift for your child. You knew your child would need a bag for the beginning of the new school year, so you bought the best bag on the market. You buy a bag for your child and you send them to school with it. When you come to pick your child from school, you see that your child is wearing his/her old school bag from last year which was torn everywhere, discoloured and dirty. Then you ask your child “Why didn’t you use the bag I offered you? I saved for this, I looked for the best bag. What’s wrong with you?”
Actually, if you’re this child you have no excuse.
It’s almost the same thing with our relationship with God. Jesus Christ gave His life on The Cross for you, He sacrificed Himself for you, and for me, and how do we thank Him? We pick our old, dirty, torn nature of sin and we leave sin to entangle us.
What’s even worse is we act as if we’re victims, we really believe that we’re victims of our circumstances and that we can’t get rid of x or y sin, we let them grow roots in our lives and parasite us. We don’t enjoy the gift of Jesus Christ as we should.

2. We Are At War With Sin : We Are Expected To Fight And To Win

Hebrews 12:4 NIV

In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.

Judges 3:1‭-‬2 NLT

These are the nations that the Lord left in the land to test those Israelites who had not experienced the wars of Canaan. He did this to teach warfare to generations of Israelites who had no experience in battle.

God knows that we are in a battle against evil. Heaven knows this, Hell knows this, but it looks like us Christians we are the only ones not knowing it.
We want everything to be easy, we don’t want to fight in the spiritual realm, we prefer running pity parties, going from place to place for Deliverance but never receiving it. At times we become so comfortable with our sin, not because we love it, not because we hate God, but because we aren’t ready to resist , to fight, to do all it takes to win.
We try to overcome a specific sin two-three times and when it doesn’t work we give up, we forget who we are, we forget that we are warriors, we settle down for less than God’s calling for us.

3. God Disciplines/Corrects Us

Hebrews 12:5‭-‬8 NIV

And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son? It says, “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.” Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all.

When I was a little younger, I understood these verses to mean that God would punish Christians when they sin, just like our parents punished us when we misbehaved.
Now, I realize that God’s chastisement on a Christian for their sins is not the same as God’s punishment on an unbeliever (a sinner) for their sins.
Please let me put this in context before you start judging me. These verses talk about God chastising His sons and daughters, His legitimate children through adoption in Christ Jesus. It’s not the same thing as when you were not yet belonging to Christ, when you were still a sinner in God’s sight and that He punished you to bring you to repentance so that you would accept His forgiveness in Christ Jesus and become a New creation, a child of God.
Now that you’re a Christian, you are not anybody. God cannot want to let you continue in a sin which is overpowering you. He has to chastise you, even if The Holy Spirit already convicted you of that sin each time you committed it and you repented, God chooses to chastise you not because He wants to punish you but because He wants to train you, He wants to teach you to fight at all costs and to win the battle against that sin.
At times as Christians, we want a God who will only say “I love you and I forgive you “, we want a Jesus who’s never speaking to us with authority to rebuke us, we want to be spoiled kids.
However, there will be moments where God will sit you down and rebuke you, speak to you with authority to make you understand that you aren’t supposed to let sin keep you in bondage, you have to resist and fight for your freedom, you can’t live below your calling.
I admit I’m guilty of this, when I try a few times to get rid of a sinful habit and that I don’t succeed I get discouraged and I cry and I stop hoping. Then I say “will this thorn be in my flesh for the rest of my life?”.
Do you know how Jesus rebuked me recently on this?
“I didn’t die on that Cross and spill My blood for you to be in bondage to sin. You’ve come to age, you have a Bible, you know how to pray, you have The Spirit of God, you are a soldier of Jesus, I have been teaching you, so now fight and win. Stop wasting My blood, stop insulting My sacrifice on The Cross by living lower than the calling I made upon you. If someone gives their life for you at least they deserve better than this. You get up, you fight till you win this”
I found it hard, but through the lens of these verses I understand that God just did what a Good Father does, disciplining me, raising my standards, training me to stand up in life in Him.
God’s discipline and rebuke may look different for you, but the essence of it is that God doesn’t want you to live in slavery to sin. He wants you to fight; Jesus Christ fought for you, there are saints who went through the same struggle as you but they fought and resisted and won. In a certain sense, you have no excuse to live in bondage to sin, since Jesus Christ died to set you free.
John 8:34‭-‬36 NLT

Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave of sin. A slave is not a permanent member of the family, but a son is part of the family forever. So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free.

It’s Now Your Turn

Your challenge this week is to ask God to show you one sin which you have let become a parasite in your life, one sin which is holding you in bondage, that you can’t help but commit and decide that you will use every means God gives to you in Christ Jesus and that by The Spirit of God, because you are a child of God, you will overcome it this week. Not in 21 days, not in 63 days, not in 2 months, not in 5 years, this week with faith in The Name of Jesus Christ.

Prayer

Father Lord God Almighty, this week help me throw off this sin to which I had lost my freedom, which had entangled me and which I wondered if I was ever going to get rid of. Teach me through Your Holy Spirit how to fight till I win this battle. I believe that Christ Jesus died not so that I would be a slave to sin, but so that I would be free to serve Him, in Jesus Christ’s Name. Amen
Thank you so much for reading.
Please don’t forget to use the share buttons to share on all your social media, and subscribe to our newsletter so as not to miss any new blog post.
Leave a like if you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post.
Click here if you’re looking for a church. I recommend Elevation Church to you. A wonderful Christ-centered Church in which you aren’t limited by your location and in which you can see what God can do through you.
God loves you so much
God bless you
Victoria Eyog